Grandma Moses

In the years since she first started painting these rosy visions of her imagination, Grandma Moses has earned a unique place in the hearts of millions, and in the history of American art. Her paintings (more than 1,500 by her own count) have been shown in more than 160 U.S. exhibitions, and in five one-man shows abroad. She is represented in nine American museums and in Vienna’s State Gallery; hers is the only “Ecole Americaine” picture hanging in Paris’ Museum of Modern Art. Grandma’s originals—priced at $150 to $3,000 each —hang on the walls of such discriminating collectors as Mrs. Albert D. Lasker, Katharine Cornell and Thomas J. Watson. Reproductions of her work have entered thousands of less famed American homes, along with Grandma Moses china, fabrics, tiles, and, most of all, Christmas cards. Altogether some 48 million of her cards have been sold in the U.S. Next year, for the first time, they will also be printed in Vienna and distributed in 15 European countries.